Sweet Links of the Week

Since the dawn of movies and television, there have been followings, movements, heck, even downright tributes to famous movies and television series. Nowadays, these forms of fandom have shifted from the realm of television and movies to Anime and Video Games. While the realm of cosplay has been the easiest and most accessible form of fandom, it’s the effort of one’s fandom that truly seperates the casual geeks from the hardcore fans. As such, this week’s Sweet Links of the Week is all about fan films from Anime and Video Games!

Our first entry involves 3 things. A beautiful woman, A gun, and SCIENCE! Put all 3 together, and what do you have? This short Portal fan film directed by Dan Trachtenberg, is beautifully made, complete with jaw-dropping visuals, fantastic scenery, and even more awesome action.

While a fan film can be great with the right visual effects and great camera angles, some of the best fan films come complete with mind-blowing coreography, great dialogue, and staying true to the original media! One of my favorite series is and continues to be Naruto. From all the action packed fight scenes, to the awesome techniques, to the character relationships, I find the series to be spectacular. So I immediately become a skeptic when I see fan films out on the internet.

With this big gem, however, my mind has been completely blown, with no room for skepticism (other than the hair. It’s always the hair on Naruto…) with Thousand Pounds Action Co.’s first part of their movie.

As one might notice when looking around in day to day life, you night notice that many things are getting smaller and smaller. From electronic devices, to computer monitors, even cars!

see what I mean? Now let’s see how many clowns we can fit into that?

With technology and autos getting smaller nowadays, it only seems natural that one might desire to feed their inner giant every once in a while.

And on the note of food, you might be thinking of a big ass bowl of pasta, or a humongous 5 pound burger. Hell, even a HUGE ass Ice Cream Cone. Or, if you live in Japan, you could very well have one of these…

Indeed, it’s a GIANT SUSHI ROLL! And yes, you can get one of your very own at the Umewaka Restaurant in Anjo City, Japan for the low low LOW price of $197 (¥15,000)! This giant roll of sushi and fish weighs in at a whopping 5 kilograms, and features a fuckton of awesome wrapped up for a party of 5!

Now that we’ve gotten your future dinner (and bucket list entries) out of the way, if you’re still having problems with your inner giant raging out on stuff to buy, I think I’ve found just the solution for you! Ever wanted a giant pen to sign for a giant check? Ever wanted to have an epic win at Scrabble? Dare to run with giant scissors? Got a huge ass cork board with nothing to pin stuff to it?

touche, internet. touche.

Well you can satisfy those urges, and MUCH more with the folks at Great Big Stuff! They have all sorts of HUGE and GINORMOUS items for sale! Ever wanted a set of big Monopoly™ pieces? Boom! Still looking for something to go with your giant cork board? Pow! Need to give your cats a reason to bow down before you?

For as long as I can remember my first episode, I’ve been a HUGE fan of Star Trek, whether it’s The Original Series, The Next Generation, to even Voyager! It’s unique brand of storytelling, complete with awe inspiring technology and vast array of characters that drew you in. This week’s SLOTW highlights two awesome pieces of Star Trek related info!

Our first link is one for the history buffs! Not everyone knows the history of Star Trek, including it’s run dates, as well as fun tidbits of factoids that might be otherwise unknown! Fear not, for Space.com has made an infographic of the first 45 years of Star Trek for all of us to enjoy! I would put it up here on the front page, but it’s quite large and lengthy, so I’ve provided a link here!

Our second piece of info comes in the news of a series re-release onto Blu-ray! TrekCore has just announced that the Star Trek: TNG series is being remastered for a Blu-ray release! This news was also confirmed on Levar Burton’s (Geordi La Forde in TNG) twitter! For those who are fans of the series, this news is pretty awesome! For those on the Kirk side of the captain face off, you already have your DVDs, so buzz off!

And since you’ve read through this whole article (or just skipped to the images, you lazy dork…) and love us for it, why not reward yourself with some awesome bite size Star Trek Cookies?

In case you didn’t get get the joke of the headline, this week’s Sweet Link of the Week is all about one of my favorite games of all! The open box world of Minecraft!

For those new to this game (seriously, have you not heard about it somewhere?), Minecraft is an open box sandbox game created by Markus “Notch” Presson and his team over at independent startup Mojang Studios in Sweden! From it’s inception, Minecraft has gained more than a million unique players, won “Game of the Year” award at the Indie Awards, and was selected to be included in the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s “Art of Video Games” Exhibit! All this while the game is still in it’s Beta stage of development, with a release date of November 11, 2011!

With games like Minecraft, it’s only natural that people would create mods and whole new types of gameplay! From constructable games like Spleef, and the Yog-Olympics, to whole new mods and world to be played in the game, Why don’t we show you some of the more unique and fun creations that we at aniRAGE have found!

First up, we have a mod that literally asks the question “What if there were Pokemon in Minecraft?”

Well Minecraft modder Seagoingmanatee answered that for us, and in a big way!

It is the stuff of legends and has been talked about for centuries. From Gum Drops, to Licorice, it’s variety is as limited as the amount of sugar you can cram into it. And it’s culturally universal, too! Ever had British candy? How about Spanish Candy? More than likely, perhaps not, but that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy it! Take Japanese candy, for example! Have you ever had pocky? Not quite candy, but it can give you a taste of what it might be like! Well wonder no more! You too can have a sample of Japanese Candy thanks to the people at CandyJapan.com, they’ll send you a sample of Japanese candy to your doorstep twice a month for a reasonable subscription fee. Plus the fee includes your shipping!

Since my eyes have been able to look at objects, Optical Illusions have always fascinated me. From double images, to straight line tricks, to even after image illusions, they’ve shown me how my brain works, as well as what’s possible with the human mind in terms of creativity. Often or not, I also try to dissect how these illusions work, as well as how to try and fool them (I like to challenge myself sometimes). However, one particular illusions always seemed to be impossible for me to figure out, now matter how many times I checked out.

This one.

The basics behind this is that tiles A and B are the same color. Obviously, it’s not quite the same. I couldn’t bring myself to believe it… that is until a youtube video popped up that showed me that indeed it is real and obviously that my brain needs more work.

I know it’s been a while (*coughunderstatementcough*), but I’m back with a brand new SLOTW!

As we all know, chefs can create a plethora of imaginative food creations, from the most delicate and light dishes, do the heavy and fulfilling! I would know, I work as a chef for a living! And the limits to what a chef can do is only limited to what foods he has at his disposal, the tools on hand, and the imagination in his or her head. If this is the case, then we wonder what tools a Japanese Chef in Japan had at his disposal when he created these:

Personally, I think these are some of the most intricately detailed pieces I’ve ever seen carved out of food! You can see these and more creations here!

And speaking of delicious plants, I’ve been quite a big fan of Plants vs Zombies for quite a while now. And while it does get more and more hectic, I always did wonder what the reality and purpose of zombies eating plants would accomplish? Well apparently, the guys at Dorkly seemed to have answered that questions for me!

Growing up, I always wondered what it would be like if certain event happened in real life, what kinds of experiences would I have? Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who stepped through the portal to the other dimension…

Real life and video games. It’s more hand in hand than you think. Whether it’s a silly discussion on what might happen, to full blown scenarios LARPed out to perfection, we’ve been using our imagination to it’s fullest when it comes to realizing our fantasies and dreams. This week on SLOTW, we’re gonna show you some of the more fun and imaginative ways we incorporate video games into fun entertainment for all!

Real life situation, old school thought processes. – So you’ve come across a dreaded Los Angeles street crossing. You don’t have much time, and the environment is treacherous. Luckily, there’s a guide there to help you out in the most dire of straits! But be sure to pick the right choice, or you may not survive!

as imaginative as it is technical, what’s better than playing video games on a big tv screen? Well shit, why not play games on an office building?!?

Sure office building are awesome, it doesn’t feel right unless you’re right smack dab in the middle of the action yourself, racing against danger or unseen opponents. Or on a mission to rid the playing field of mines!

However, it’s not just the homebrew video fans that make the fun stuff either! Sometimes big name business have nerd fantasies of their own. Probably the biggest nerdgasm in the video game world came with an april fools trailer of epic proportions in 2009.

And last but not least, we leave you with this bit of French goodness. Seriously, makes me want to own a go-cart!

It’s no secret that DOOM is largely considered the godfather of the First Person Shooter genre of games. Released in 1993 by id Software, it popularized and revolutionized this genre of gaming for generations to come. As controversial as it was, it was also extremely popular. But more than that, it also allowed customization in the form of custom maps, and even whole new game experiences!

On this edition of Sweet Links of the Week, we delve into one such custom mod for the Doom Engine! Normally, I’d be writing this under Games to get addicted to, but I’ll explain later in this article.

Created by Logan MTM, Legacy of Suffering is a mod released in November 2009, and took the DOOM mod community by storm, eventually winning the Doomworld’s annual Cacoward for 2009. The mod combines 3d modeling and textures and scenery that looks and feels borrowed from DOOM 3 (which in all retrospect, is more of a good thing) and the atmosphere is always creepy and sensual.

The sound design is per normal Doom fare, but there are a few awesome additions to make it worthy of play. For one, it’s one to play through a dark corridor with nothing in the background. It’s a whole new game when you’re trying to go down a dark corrodidor while you’re hearing demonic and ghostly noises that send shivers down your spine. The weapon noises did get some changes but are more for the better. Weapon sounds from DOOM 3 are borrowed for the Chaingun, Plasma gun, Chainsaw, and more! I won’t spoil which weapons and what changes are in this mod exactly, but in the end, you’ll thank me for it, and you’ll enjoy it so much!

So where can you get this sweet mod?

Why download the mod from the mod team’s website from here! But be sure to download GZDoom and SkullTag, which is required to play the game.

So you’ve had a hard day at work, you feel like having a quiet night on the town, and you have no friends to accompany you. What do you do? Well why not tempt fate and go out for a quiet night of poker with familiar faces and make some new friends.

That’s what Telltale Games decided to give you with their new game (as well as our Sweet Link of the Week!), a smorgasbord of quiet, casual fun, combined with epic amounts of fan service all rolled into one! Well what makes this game really sweet, you may ask? Well it’s the cast of characters that join you at the poker table for some Texas Hold’ Em. Max from the “Sam and Max Series” series, Strong Bad from Homestarrunner.com, The Heavy from TF2, and Tycho Brae from Penny Arcade. For someone like me, that’s a fan service explosion right off the bat! 4 great characters, whether from popular culture, or video games, get together and play poker against you!

But that’s not all that happens. Telltale took it up a step further and included some great dialogue within the game! You’ll hear some riduculous conversations between the characters, all of which stay in character even throughout the game! Best of all, all the characters are voiced with the same voices as you remember them from all their games and cartoons!

As for gameplay… well yes it’s standard No Limit Texas Hold ‘Em Poker, but the game is driven and influenced by each character’s personalities and mannerisms. This makes for some pretty epic and hillarious conversations between each other, as well as some VERY interesting game play! I’ll look into writing a proper review for this game at a later point!

Oh yeah, speaking of which, someone might be wondering where you can get this game at? Well you can get this fun little game for 5 bucks off of Steam! And for all the character dialogue and poker, that’s a pretty amazing price! And with it, you have the chance to unlock sweet items to use in TF2 as well!

And for those wanting to look before you touch, here’s our chap TotalBiscuit playing the game!

After much debate, and careful consideration (for all of 5 minutes), SLOTW will actually change it’s format! Instead of two or three links, we’ll instead focus on one single topic and provide you with some links in reference to that topic! It’ll allow me to focus more on one topic instead of multiple ones.

So with that explained to you all, let’s get going to our Sweet Links of the Week!

Everyone likes to dance, right? Getting down on the dance floor, getting your boogie on, shaking your b- okay you know what I’m saying. And you’ve probably seen those music video full of choreographed dance moves that look either too complicated or too fast for you. Well SLOTW features a group that is slowly becoming a favorite dance group for me!

World Order is a group fronted by Genki Sudo, essayist, actor, and retired successful MMA Fighter. And if there’s any indication of his prowess on a dance floor, here’s his best fighting entrances. And with a 16-4 fight record, it looks like he certainly did have time for goofing off before a match!

After retiring from the ring, Sudo actually became involved in World Order, to which he actually writes the songs, as well as writes the choreography for their music videos (which is easily my favorite part of the group).

The formula World Order uses for their music videos is one of extreme close knit synchronization and precision as well as slow robot like movement…. again, all choreographed by Sudo himself. This precision for a seven member group is nothing short of amazing, and I hope that Sudo and World Order continue their success!